Bottles running on an Infinity
Accumulation table always move in
one direction, allowing for minimal
bottle contact. This decreases label
damage, allows for higher outfeed
rates, and reduces noise. The table
resembles an oval-shaped race track
and incorporates an innovative loop
system. The table does not use a traditional
return chain underneath the
entire conveyor, but rather returns
chain immediately back to the tail section.
This minimizes chain quantities
and makes it easy to clean.

As bottles are single-filed, they
flow smoothly out of the accumulation
loop with the aid of Garvey's
patented Slow Down Lane, a slowermoving
conveyor that helps prevent
bottle turbulence near the outfeed,
making tapered bottles run just like
straight-wall bottles.

Those types of conveyors have a
small percentage of available accumulation
space, but Garvey Infinity
tables utilize 90% or more of the available
space for accumulation, shrinking
the overall length of the line in the
process.

Like the age-old adage "a chain is
as strong as its weakest link," a bottling
line without accumulation is like
a chain waiting to break.

Accumulation adds value by decoupling
the efficiencies of each machine
so when a malfunction occurs on one
machine, other

machines are unaffected. Constraint theory tells us that
every production line has a single bottleneck
that limits its maximum output
capacity.

Rodney Strong Vineyards and
Garvey identified the 180 bpm Bertolaso
filler/corker as the limitation and
made preventing downtime on it a
high priority. The other machines
operate at slightly higher speeds in
order to empty or refill the accumulation
tables. (Maximum productivity of
the previous bottling line was 120
bpm.)

The first Garvey Infinity accumulation
table is installed between an ABC
uncaser and the Bertolaso monobloc
(cleaner / filler / corker / capper). The
uncaser feeds the Infinity table at
speeds of up to 240 bpm and the
Infinity can hold up to 1,000 750ml
bottles, allowing for a maximum
downtime of 5.5 minutes on the
uncaser before the monobloc runs out
of empty bottles. This keeps a sustained
population of bottles on the
accumulation table upstream from the
constraint at all times.

A second Garvey Infinity accumulation
table is placed between the
Bertolaso monobloc and the Robino &
Galadrino (R&G) capsuler. Unlike the
first table, which is normally full, the
second Infinity table is normally
empty and waiting to accept product
during downtimes on the R&G capsuler
or the Krones labeler. This table
gives the filler/corker the ability to
keep operating even if the rest of the
line is stopped for up to seven minutes.

The second Infinity table holds up
to 1,245 bottles. Garvey added capacity
of an additional 245 bottles, so
once a bottle begins the filling process,
the Infinity will always have capacity
to accept it.

A third Garvey Infinity accumulation
table is placed between a Krones
labeler and a Standard-Knapp case
packer. This Infinity outfeeds the
product in three distinct rows directly
into the case packer. It has a maximum
capacity of 600 750ml bottles and protects
upstream machines from case
packer downtime for up to 2.5 minutes.

Most tapered bottling requires
operators to stand up fallen bottles
feeding into their automated case
packer. Once bottles are filled, capsuled,
labeled, and ready to be
packed, the last thing you want is
rework on them. When a tapered bottle
falls, it tends to take a few other
bottles with it, creating huge issues at
the case packer.

This Garvey Infinity accumulation table allows the filler to keep running if the labeler is
down. It accepts up to 1,245 bottles from the filler, and feeds them single-file to a conveyor
leading to the labeler.